Wrestling the Angel

The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity

Terryl L. Givens

Definitive study of Mormonism from one of the field's most respected scholars

The deepest and most wide-ranging examination of the development of Mormon thought ever written

Explores Mormon beliefs and practices as well as the theological history of the religion

Wrestling the Angel

The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity

Terryl L. Givens

Description

In this first volume of his magisterial study of the foundations of Mormon thought and practice, Terryl L. Givens offers a sweeping account of Mormon belief from its founding to the present day. Situating the relatively new movement in the context of the Christian tradition, he reveals that Mormonism continues to change and grow.

Givens shows that despite Mormonism's origins in a biblical culture strongly influenced by nineteenth-century Restorationist thought, which advocated a return to the Christianity of the early Church, the new movement diverges radically from the Christianity of the creeds. Mormonism proposes its own cosmology and metaphysics, in which human identity is rooted in a premortal world as eternal as God. Mormons view mortal life as an
enlightening ascent rather than a catastrophic fall, and reject traditional Christian concepts of human depravity and destiny. Popular fascination with Mormonism's social innovations, such as polygamy and communalism, and its supernatural and esoteric elements-angels, gold plates, seer stones, a New World Garden of Eden, and sacred undergarments-have long overshadowed the fact that it is the most enduring and even thriving product of the nineteenth century's religious upheavals and innovations.

Wrestling the Angel traces the essential contours of Mormon thought from the time of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young to the contemporary LDS church, illuminating both the seminal influence of the founding generation of Mormon thinkers and the significant developments in the church over
almost 200 years. The most comprehensive account of the development of Mormon thought ever written, Wrestling the Angel will be essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the Mormon faith.

Wrestling the Angel

The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity

Terryl L. Givens

Author Information

Terryl L. Givens is Professor of Literature and Religion and James A. Bostwick Chair of English at the University of Richmond. His books on Mormonism and American religious culture include By the Hand of Mormon, People of Paradox, Parley P. Pratt (with Matthew Grow), and Viper on the Hearth.

Wrestling the Angel

The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity

Terryl L. Givens

Reviews and Awards

"Givens successfully tackles a mountain of logistical, chronological, and topical challenges in an astonishing work of scholarship. This comprehensive and impressive volume is fundamental in the study of an important, multifaceted, and understudied piece of religious history." --Library Journal

"Givens has given us a hugely impressive, erudite and systematic work. He shows us the vast and complex landscape of this most extraordinary and most American of religions. Through this monumental work we experience the sheer scale and audacity of Mormon cosmology and theology and how this transforms our understanding of divine nature and human nature alike." --Simon Critchley, Hans Jonas Professor, The New School for Social Research

"Givens has provided the most thorough and expert accounting of Mormonism's place in the Christian thought-world. The book raises the bar for those who would challenge Mormonism's status as a Christian faith. For the rest of us, who simply want to understand Mormonism, it is a welcome gift of fine scholarship." --Kathleen Flake, Richard Lyman Bushman Professor in Mormon Studies, University of Virginia

"We--general readers and scholars--need a lucid survey of the Latter-day Saints' complex doctrinal developments. We also need work that places the whole of Mormon theology in conversation with Western culture and historic Christian thought. We now have both in one remarkable, rewarding book." --David Holland, Associate Professor of North American Religious History, Harvard Divinity School

"In a sweep of enormous scope Givens takes Mormon thought from the cultural world of its nineteenth century American emergence through theological debates on orthodoxy-heresy amongst the early Christian Fathers to Protestantism's heyday and to today's Latter-day Saint distinctiveness." --Douglas J. Davies, author of The Mormon Culture of Salvation

"Terryl Givens' careful and detailed account succeeds admirably in its goal of presenting the origins and development of Mormon theology clearly. The book is particularly welcome for giving readers a solid sense of where Latter-day Saint theology aligns with, and differs from, the theologies of main Christian traditions." --Mark A. Noll, author of America's God: From Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln

"Terryl Givens's scholarship is magisterial, yet this book brilliantly synthesizes key themes in Mormon thought in a way which is accessible and engaging for the non-specialist reader. An essential study of contemporary Mormon religious thought and its origins which should be read by any serious student of comparative Christian traditions." --Fenella Cannell, Associate Professor of Anthropology, London School of Economics and Political Science

"Givens, possibly the most significant voice in the field of Mormon studies, has previously explained Mormonism by way of scripture, history, and philosophy. Here, he turns his attention to theology, a more difficult proposition than it sounds, since Mormons tend to emphasize practical living rather than theological speculation and believe in continuing revelation...What emerges is a complex, nuanced picture of a dynamic faith." --Publishers Weekly

"Wrestling the Angel not only succeeds in providing the most comprehensive and rigorous overview of Mormonism's theological tradition, but it is, in the end, a key contribution-perhaps the most important contribution in the last half-century-to that very tradition." --The Juvenile Instructor